Passages: Joe Lala: Mar 18, 2014
Joe Lala, regarded as one of greatest musicians to come out of Tampa for his drum work a generation of rock’s top performers, died at a hospital Tuesday morning at 66 of complications from lung cancer. Lala, a Tampa native, performed percussion for such influential acts as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, the Allman Brothers, The Eagles, The Bee Gees, The Byrds, Eric Clapton, Neal Diamond, Kenny Rogers, John Mellencamp and Barbara Streisand. He accumulated 32 Gold Records and 28 Platinum records and played on the movie soundtracks of “Saturday Night Fever,” “Staying Alive,” “D.C. Cab,” “Streets of Fire” and many more. Lala was perhaps best known locally for the Latin-tinged pop/rock band Blues Image, founded in Tampa and famous for the song “Ride Captain Ride” — No. 4 during 1970 on both the Billboard Hot 100 and the Canadian RPM magazine charts. (SOURCE: Tampa Tribune)
Passages: William "Bunny Rugs" Clarke: Feb 3, 2014
William “Bunny Rugs” Clarke, the husky-voiced lead singer of internationally popular reggae band Third World, died of leukemia at his home in Florida, longtime friends and colleagues said Monday. He was 65. Former bandmate Colin Leslie said the singer died Sunday in Orlando a week after he was released from a hospital following cancer treatment. Clarke worked with the band Inner Circle and top reggae producer Lee “Scratch” Perry in Jamaica before joining Third World in 1976. The next year, the band released “96 Degrees in the Shade,” one of its most popular albums. The group was signed to Island Records and had hits on British and U.S. charts, including “Now That We Found Love,” ”Always Around” and “Reggae Ambassador.” He performed on all of Third World’s records except the group’s debut. (SOURCE: The Grio)
Passages: Pete Seeger: Jan 27, 2014
Mr. Seeger, a 20th-century troubadour who inspired and led a renaissance of folk music in the United States with his trademark five-string banjo and songs of love, peace, brotherhood, work and protest, died Jan. 27 at a hospital in New York City. He was 94. His grandson Kitama Cahill-Jackson confirmed his death to the Associated Press. The cause was not reported. For more than 50 years, Mr. Seeger roamed America, singing on street corners and in saloons, migrant labor camps, hobo jungles, union halls, schools, churches and concert auditoriums. He helped write, arrange or revive such perennial favorites as “If I Had a Hammer,” “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” and “Kisses Sweeter Than Wine” and popularized the anthem of the civil rights movement, “We Shall Overcome.”
Passages: Phil Everly: Jan 3, 2014
There is no more beautiful sound than the voices of siblings swirled together in high harmony, and when Phil and Don Everly combined their voices with songs about yearning, angst and loss, it changed the world.Phil Everly, the youngest of the Everly Brothers who took the high notes, died Friday from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He was 74. He left a towering legacy that still inspires half a century after The Everly Brothers' first hit. You could argue that while Elvis Presley was the king of rock 'n' roll, Phil and Don Everly were its troubled princes. They sang dark songs hidden behind deceptively pleasing harmonies and were perfect interpreters of the twitchy hearts of millions of baby boomer teens coming of age in the 1950s and '60s looking (SOURCE: Yahoo News)
Passages: Yusef Lateef: Dec 23, 2013
Legendary jazz master and Five College Distinguished Professor of music and music education Yusef Lateef died Monday at his home in Shutesbury. He was 93. Heralded as a true innovator as a composer and as a stylist in performances on tenor saxophone, flute and other instruments, Lateef played with the likes of Charlie Mingus and Dizzy Gillespie, as well as appearing locally at the University of Massachusetts Fine Arts Center and other area venues. Lateef earned a doctorate from the UMass Amherst College of Education in 1975, and served for 14 years as Five College professor, retiring in 2002. A Grammy Award winner, he also received a National Endowment for the Arts award in 2010. Widely regarded as devoted, patient and compassionate teacher, he continued performing until this past summer. Stephen Holden of The New York Times described one Lateef performance as exhibiting “a semi-improvisatory style pointedly [that] juxtaposes Western and non-Western modes in loosely connected pieces that evoke a natural world of wind-rustled grasslands and grazing animals.” Back in 1977, Times reviewer C. Gerald Fraser noted that Lateef had at that point already been performing professionally for 40 years, giving him a nearly unparalleled performing perspective on the evolution of jazz.
Passages: Ray Price: Dec 16, 2013:
Ray Price, one of country music's most popular and influential singers and bandleaders who had more than 100 hits and was one of the last living connections to Hank Williams, died Monday. He was 87.
Price died Monday afternoon at his ranch outside Mount Pleasant, said Billy Mack Jr., who was acting as a family spokesman. Billie Perryman, the wife of family friend and spokesman Tom Perryman, a DJ with KKUS-FM in Tyler, also confirmed his death.
Price was discharged last week from the East Texas Medical Center in Tyler, where he had been in and out in recent months as he was treated for cancer and its complications. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2011 and it has recently spread to his liver, intestines and lungs, the hospital said. (SOURCE: Fox News)
Price died Monday afternoon at his ranch outside Mount Pleasant, said Billy Mack Jr., who was acting as a family spokesman. Billie Perryman, the wife of family friend and spokesman Tom Perryman, a DJ with KKUS-FM in Tyler, also confirmed his death.
Price was discharged last week from the East Texas Medical Center in Tyler, where he had been in and out in recent months as he was treated for cancer and its complications. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2011 and it has recently spread to his liver, intestines and lungs, the hospital said. (SOURCE: Fox News)
Passages: Bob Beckham: Nov 11, 2013
Music publisher Robert Joseph "Bob" Beckham, who mentored the careers of Kris Kristofferson, Dolly Parton and many others, died Monday morning (Nov. 11) at Summit Hospital in Hermitage, Tenn. He was 86.
As an employee and later co-owner of Combine Music, where he worked from 1964 until the company was sold in 1986, Beckham was also a key player in the success of such songwriters as Ray Stevens, Larry Gatlin, Jerry Reed, Tony Joe White, Bob DiPiero, Bob Morrison and Dennis Linde (who married Beckham's daughter).
Beckham was born July 8, 1927, in Stratford, Okla. He began working in a traveling entertainment show when he was 8 and subsequently dabbled in movie acting in California before returning to Oklahoma. He became a U.S. Army paratrooper at the age of 17 near the end of World War II. (SOURCE: CMT)
As an employee and later co-owner of Combine Music, where he worked from 1964 until the company was sold in 1986, Beckham was also a key player in the success of such songwriters as Ray Stevens, Larry Gatlin, Jerry Reed, Tony Joe White, Bob DiPiero, Bob Morrison and Dennis Linde (who married Beckham's daughter).
Beckham was born July 8, 1927, in Stratford, Okla. He began working in a traveling entertainment show when he was 8 and subsequently dabbled in movie acting in California before returning to Oklahoma. He became a U.S. Army paratrooper at the age of 17 near the end of World War II. (SOURCE: CMT)
Passages: Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre: Nov 9, 2013
A certain kind of creative magic was happening in the mid-nineteen-sixties on the South Side of Chicago. A group of African-American experimentalists organized themselves into a collective called the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, or the A.A.C.M., that has produced some of the most revolutionary American sounds of the past fifty years. Rather than adopting any particular style, the A.A.C.M. nurtured the radical individualism of its members, blowing past the idiomatic restrictions of jazz while embracing its tradition of innovation. The combination of a supportive community of fellow outsiders with a committed philosophy of artistic independence and creative investigation resulted in an extraordinary cohort of musicians and composers: Muhal Richard Abrams, the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Anthony Braxton, Wadada Leo Smith, and Henry Threadgill, to name a few. Last week, this family lost one of its members, an artist less known to the wider public but admired deeply by his peers: Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre, who passed away on November 9th. (SOURCE: New Yorker )
Passages: Lou Reed: Oct 27, 2013
Lou Reed, the singer, songwriter and guitarist whose work with the Velvet Underground in the 1960s had an impact on generations of rock musicians, and who remained a powerful if polarizing force for the rest of his life, died on Sunday at his home in Southampton, N.Y., on Long Island. He was 71. The cause was liver disease, said Dr. Charles Miller of the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, where Mr. Reed had liver transplant surgery earlier this year and was being treated again until a few days ago. “I’ve always believed that there’s an amazing number of things you can do through a rock ‘n’ roll song,” Mr. Reed once told the journalist Kristine McKenna, “and that you can do serious writing in a rock song if you can somehow do it without losing the beat. The things I’ve written about wouldn’t be considered a big deal if they appeared in a book or movie.”
Passages: Cal Smith: Oct 10, 2013
Cal Smith, a country hitmaker most well-known for the 1974 ACM and CMA award-winning hit ‘Country Bumpkin,” died on Thursday (Oct. 10) at the age of 81. While that chart-topper is his signature song, it’s only one part of a lengthy career that included multiple No. 1s and a run with Ernest Tubb.
‘Drinking Champagne’ was his first Top 40 hit, but a 1973 cover of Bill Anderson‘s ‘The Lord Knows I’m Drinking’ would be his first smash, reaching No. 1 on the country charts. Two more No. 1 hits would follow, including the Song of the Year at both major awards shows for the Don Wayne-penned ‘Country Bumpkin.”
Smith was living in Branson, Mo. at the time of his death. OzarksFirst.com was first to report his passing. The singer leaves behind wife Darlene, a son, five grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren. The cause of death and funeral details have not been released. (SOURCE: Taste of Country)
‘Drinking Champagne’ was his first Top 40 hit, but a 1973 cover of Bill Anderson‘s ‘The Lord Knows I’m Drinking’ would be his first smash, reaching No. 1 on the country charts. Two more No. 1 hits would follow, including the Song of the Year at both major awards shows for the Don Wayne-penned ‘Country Bumpkin.”
Smith was living in Branson, Mo. at the time of his death. OzarksFirst.com was first to report his passing. The singer leaves behind wife Darlene, a son, five grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren. The cause of death and funeral details have not been released. (SOURCE: Taste of Country)
Passages: Marvin Rainwater: Sept 17, 2013
Marvin Rainwater, a classically trained pianist who improbably turned to country music after an accident in a garage, then wrote and recorded the hit songs “Gonna Find Me a Bluebird” and “Whole Lotta Woman,” died on Tuesday in Minneapolis. He was 88. The cause was heart failure, his wife, Sheree, said.
Mr. Rainwater’s piano playing was curtailed after he lost part of his right thumb in an accident while working in a garage as a teenager. He turned to the guitar, and to singing country music in his twangy baritone, while serving in the Navy during World War II.
“When I went in the Navy, I was so lonesome for my music,” Mr. Rainwater said in an interview with Minnesota Public Radio in 1998. “Then I started writing songs, and naturally it fell back to my roots as a boy in Oklahoma, and they turned out to be hillbilly songs.” (SOURCE: New York Times)
Mr. Rainwater’s piano playing was curtailed after he lost part of his right thumb in an accident while working in a garage as a teenager. He turned to the guitar, and to singing country music in his twangy baritone, while serving in the Navy during World War II.
“When I went in the Navy, I was so lonesome for my music,” Mr. Rainwater said in an interview with Minnesota Public Radio in 1998. “Then I started writing songs, and naturally it fell back to my roots as a boy in Oklahoma, and they turned out to be hillbilly songs.” (SOURCE: New York Times)
Passages: Jackie Lomax: Sept 15, 2013
Jackie Lomax, a singer-songwriter who worked with The Beatles and enjoyed a long solo career, has died at age 69. Lomax died Sunday in the Wirral, near Liverpool in northwest England, following a brief illness, according to his official website.
Website manager Alistair Hepburn said Wednesday that Lomax's family told him of the death. The family also released a statement to The Beatles Shop in Liverpool, manager Stephen Bailey said.
Lomax was signed to the Beatles' Apple label in the 1960s. He had known the band members since their early days at Liverpool's Cavern Club, when he was a member of The Undertakers, one of the most popular bands on the thriving Liverpool music scene. (SOURCE: Huffington Post)
Website manager Alistair Hepburn said Wednesday that Lomax's family told him of the death. The family also released a statement to The Beatles Shop in Liverpool, manager Stephen Bailey said.
Lomax was signed to the Beatles' Apple label in the 1960s. He had known the band members since their early days at Liverpool's Cavern Club, when he was a member of The Undertakers, one of the most popular bands on the thriving Liverpool music scene. (SOURCE: Huffington Post)
Passages: Chet Flippo: June 23, 2013
Chet Flippo, a dean of pop music journalism whose profiles of artists like Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Tanya Tucker for Rolling Stone magazine in the 1970s heralded vast new popularity for country music among broader audiences in the United States, died last Wednesday in Nashville. He was 69.
His death, after a long illness, was announced by the country music cable channel CMT, where he was editorial director. No cause was given. (SOURCE: New York Times)
His death, after a long illness, was announced by the country music cable channel CMT, where he was editorial director. No cause was given. (SOURCE: New York Times)
Passages: Slim Whitman: June 19, 2013
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Slim Whitman, one of country music's most unique song stylists of the past six decades, died of heart failure Wednesday at a Florida hospital, his family said. He was 90.
With millions of records sold, Whitman's keen ability at yodeling and his high octave falsetto kept fans entertained for years. Born in Tampa, Florida, Whitman grew up enamored with the music of the "Singing Brakeman," Jimmie Rodgers. However, it wasn't until his stint in the United States Navy came to an end following the end of World War II that he decided to pursue music as a profession. |
Passages: Jason Molina: March 18, 2013
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Jason Molina has died at the age of 39. According to Chunklet, the Lorain, Ohio-born singer-songwriter passed away on Saturday, March 16th from organ failure due to excessive alcohol consumption. In 1996, Molina formed Songs: Ohia and released his debut single, “Nor Cease Thou Never Now”, through Palace Records. He went on to release seven full-length albums, culminating in 2003 with Magnolia Electric Co., produced by Steve Albini, before renaming the project to Magnolia Electric Co. Under that moniker, Molina released three more studio albums, a live album, and a box set between 2005 and 2009. In late 2011, Molina’s family revealed the musician’s problems with alcohol and began asking for contributions to a medical fund aiding in his recovery. At the time, Molina was working on a farm in West Virginia.
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Passages: Feb 2, 2013: Reg Presley
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Reg Presley, the lead singer of the 1960s rock band The Troggs, has died at the age of 71. Presley died at his home in Andover, Hampshire from cancer.
In December, the singer best known for the hit single Wild Thing, was diagnosed with lung cancer after becoming ill during a tour in Germany. He is also reported to have had a series of strokes in the year leading up to the diagnosis. On 24 January Presley wrote to fans on the band's website: "I am receiving chemotherapy treatment and at the moment not feeling too bad. However I've had to call time on The Troggs and retire. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you all for the cards and calls and for your love, loyalty and support over the years … I shall miss you all. Lots of Love." |
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Passages: Leroy "Sugarfoot" Bonner: Jan 27, 2013
Funk legend Leroy “Sugarfoot” Bonner has died, according to friends and musicians. “He was a great person with a lot of wisdom not just in music, but in life,” said Keith Harrison of the bands FAZE-O and the Dazz Band. Bonner, 69, who helped make Dayton the Land of Funk, died Saturday following a battle with cancer in Trotwood, according to an “Official Family Annoucement” posted Sunday on his Facebook page. Bonner, whose career spanned 56 years, died just shy of his 70th birthday, according to the post. “While his family, friends, colleagues, and fans mourn his passing they celebrate fondly his memory, music and legacy,” the posting stated. The Hamilton native was the lead singer and guitarist of the Ohio Players since he joined the band in 1971.
Harrison said he received word of Bonner’s passing from Marshall “Rock” Jones and another Ohio Players band member. (SOURCE: Dayton Daily News: "Ohio Players frontman Leroy ‘Sugarfoot’ Bonner dies")
Harrison said he received word of Bonner’s passing from Marshall “Rock” Jones and another Ohio Players band member. (SOURCE: Dayton Daily News: "Ohio Players frontman Leroy ‘Sugarfoot’ Bonner dies")
Passages: Jan 13, 2013: David Wilson
Songwriter and producer David Wilson died Sunday, Jan. 13, at the young age of 34. Wilson was country singer Mindy McCready's boyfriend and the father of their 9-month-old son. He had also become a father figure to the singer's older son from a previous relationship. "David was my soulmate; he was a caregiver and guiding hand to our sons, Zander and Zayne," McCready writes in a statement. "He was a precious gift from God to all of us and, yesterday, he returned home and is now with his mother and father. David loved and he was loved. Those who knew and loved him will miss him; those who did not know David, missed the opportunity to know a truly loving and gifted man." There is no word yet on the cause of Wilson's death. Our deepest condolences go out to his family and friends. (SOURCE: the Boot)
Passages: Frank Page: Jan 9, 2013
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You may not know the name Frank Page right off the bat, but without him the musical landscape could be a lot different. Page, who died Wednesday at age 87, was the host of "Louisiana Hayride," a country music showcase program broadcast on both radio and television. Frank is perhaps best known for introducing the debut of a young rockabilly singer named Elvis Presley. Presley performed "That's Alright Mama" on the radio version of "Louisiana Hayride" in 1954, before making his first national television appearance on the TV version in 1955. The Associated Press reports that Frank remained with radio station KWKH, the original home of Louisiana Hayride, until his retirement in 2005 after 65 years of service.(SOURCE: Zap2it)
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Passages: Mike Triay: Jan 1, 2013
Mike “In the Night” Triay, 48, a Miami radio host who was part of the production team responsible for the mid-’90s hit Macarena in the United States, died Sunday after suffering a heart attack. Triay, Carlos de Yarza and radio personality Jammin Johnny Caride were the Bayside Boys, whose English-language remix of Spanish duo Los del Rio’s song Macarena turned what had been a popular song in Latin America and U.S. Latin clubs into a major worldwide hit. Caride, who in the mid-’90s was on Miami station Power 96, caught on to Macarena after customers at a Miami club where he worked as a disc jockey kept requesting the song. He brought it to his bosses at Power 96, who asked for an English language version. Caride asked Yarza and Triay, his partners in Bayside Records, to help him rework the original. (SOURCE: Miami Herald)
Passages: Sammy Johns: Jan 4, 2013:01.04.13
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Country singer Sammy Johns has passed away at the age of 66. He died of unknown causes in Gaston, N.C., on Friday. Born in Charlotte, Johns began playing the guitar when he was only nine and he later formed his own band, the Devilles. He landed a recording contract in 1973 and scored a hit with "Chevy Van," which went on to sell in excess of three million copies. The tune has since been called "The Song of the Seventies" by Rolling Stone magazine. He also wrote popular track "America" for Waylon Jennings, "Desperado Love" for Conway Twitty and "Common Man" for John Conlee. Johns released his last album, "Honky Tonk Moon," in 2000. He is to be remembered during a funeral service in Belmont on Wednesday. (SOURCE: MSN)
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01.02.13: Jon Fromer
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Jon Fromer, an award-winning Bay Area television producer and folk musician who tirelessly championed civil and labor rights, died on Jan. 2 at his home in Mill Valley. He was 66. The cause was stomach cancer, said his wife of 42 years, Mary Fromer. For years, Jon Fromer produced a variety of programs for KQED-TV, including the science show "Quest" and comedian Will Durst's talk show "The Durst Amendment." He also composed the theme song for "We Do the Work," a PBS series about America's working class. (SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle)
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o1.01.13: Patti Page
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Unforgettable songs like "Tennessee Waltz" and "(How Much Is That) Doggie in the Window" made Patti Page the best-selling female singer of the 1950s and a star who would spend much of the rest of her life traveling the world. When unspecified health problems finally stopped her decades of touring, though, Page wrote a sad-but-resolute letter to her fans late last year about the change. "Although I feel I still have the voice God gave me, physical impairments are preventing me from using that voice as I had for so many years," Page wrote. "It is only He who knows what the future holds." Page died on New Year's Day in Encinitas, Calif., according to publicist Schatzi Hageman, ending one of pop music's most diverse careers. She was 85 and just five weeks away from being honored at the Grammy Awards with a Lifetime Achievement Award from The Recording Academy. (SOURCE: Fox News)
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12.26.12: Fontella Bass
Fontella Bass returned the luster to Chess Records. She co-wrote the 1965 hit “Rescue Me,” which became the first million-selling record for Chess since Chuck Berry a decade earlier. Mrs. Bass died Wednesday night at a St. Louis hospital of complications from a heart attack she suffered three weeks ago. A St. Louis native, Mrs. Bass was 72. Her musical roots ran as deep as the Missouri Valley. Her mother was gospel singer Martha Bass, one of the legendary Clara Ward Singers. Mrs. Bass’ grandmother was gospel singer Nevada Carter, and as a 5-year-old Mrs. Bass began playing piano when her grandmother sang at St. Louis area funerals. In 1965, Mrs. Bass was married to avant-garde trumpet player Lester Bowie, who became a founding member of Chicago’s Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). (They divorced in 1978; he died in 1999.) (SOURCE: Chicago Sun Times )
12.24.12: Capital Steez
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Capital Steez, an up-and-coming rapper in the Brooklyn-based Pro Era collective, died on Monday morning. Steez, real name Jamal Dewar, was 19. The rapper's friend and collaborator Joey Bada$$ announced the news on Twitter, saying, "This unfortunate xmas eve… Lost a best friend, a brother, a pro, a partner. Letting go is never easy." Bada$$ goes on to say that "part of me doesn't believe this." Other members of New Era to post comments include Chuck Strangers and CJ Fly. This week the rap collective released the mixtape, PEEP: The Aprocopalypse on Cinematic Affairs. Label CEO Johnny Shipes also confirmed the death on Twitter, writing "R.I.P. STEEZ." Further details on the cause of death have not been disclosed, however there is speculation that the rapper may have committed suicide as his final message on Twitter reads, simply, "The end." (SOURCE: Hollywood Reporter)
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12.24.12: Mike Scaccia
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The lead guitarist for heavy metal band Rigor Mortis died shortly after collapsing on stage from a heart attack during a performance early Sunday morning. Forty-seven-year-old Mike Scaccia suffered an apparent seizure on stage during a performance at the Rail Club in Fort Worth, Texas, and was rushed to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead, Blabbermouth.net reported. Rigor Mortis’ Saturday night gig at the Rail Club had been a birthday bash for frontman Bruce Corbitt. Witnesses told the metal news site that the singer had asked for the club’s strobe lights to be turned down just moments before Scaccia’s collapse. The Tarrant County medical examiner’s office, however, listed a sudden heart attack caused by heart disease as the cause of death, according to the Fort Worth Star Telegram. “My brother is gone!" Corbitt wrote on Facebook on Sunday morning. "The only reason I am who I am is because of this man. If it wasn't for him I wouldn't even be in a band. (SOURCE: New York Daily News )
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12.23.12: Ken Chaney
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Pianist Ken Chaney wasn't as famous as many of his Chicago colleagues, but the high caliber of his playing, the originality of his composing-arranging and the extent of his advocacy efforts for jazz made him an important figure in Chicago music. As bandleader, Chaney built a loyal following for his ensembles, such as the Awakening and the Ken Chaney Xperience. As pianist, he won the admiration of listeners for the versatility of his work. And as jazz crusader, he encouraged generations of young musicians to pursue the art form to which he devoted his life. Chaney died Wednesday at his South Side home at age 73 of natural causes, said his son Kenin Chaney. (SOURCE: Chicago Tribune )
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Ken Chaney, let, at keyboard, died at 73 (December 23, 2012)
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12.23.12: Marva Whitney
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Marva Whitney, the R&B-funk singer who died at age 68, according to her official Facebook page, toured with the James Brown Revue from 1967 to 1970, and briefly held the spotlight on her own with three hits she charted in 1969. Rolling Stone reports the cause of death as complications from pneumonia. Whitney, whom Brown called "Soul Sister No. 1," got her biggest hit with a response to the Isley Brothers’ “It’s Your Thing,” a song she delivered as “It’s My Thing (You Can’t Tell Me Who to Sock It To).” "We're saddened to inform you that Soulsister #1 Marva Whitney passed away last night," the post that went up Sunday said. "She left us with a legacy that will shine forever. Please keep her family in your prayers." (SOURCE: LA Times )
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Singer Marva Whitney performs with James Brown in an undated photo. (Facebook.com/MarvaWhitney)
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12.21.12: Lee Dorman
Lee Dorman, the bassist for psychedelic rock band Iron Butterfly, has died at age 70. Orange County Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Gail Krause says Dorman was found dead in a vehicle Friday morning. A coroner’s investigation is under way, but foul play is not suspected. Krause said Dorman may have been on his way to a doctor’s appointment when he died. Iron Butterfly was formed and rose to prominence in the late 1960s. Its second album, “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” sold more than 30 million copies, according to the band’s website. The title track’s distinctive notes have been featured in numerous films and TV shows including “The Simpsons,” ”That ’70s Show” and in the series finale of “Rescue Me.” Douglas Lee Dorman was born in September 1942 and had been living in Laguna Nigel, a coastal city in Southern California, when he died. (SOURCE: Entertainment Weekly )
12.12.12: Ravi Shankar
Ravi Shankar, the sitar virtuoso who became a hippie musical icon of the 1960s after hobnobbing with the Beatles and who introduced traditional Indian ragas to Western audiences over a 10-decade career, died Tuesday. He was 92. A statement on the musician's website said he died in San Diego, near his Southern California home. The musician's foundation issued a statement saying that he had suffered upper respiratory and heart problems and had undergone heart-valve replacement surgery last week. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also confirmed his death and called Shankar a "national treasure." Labeled "the godfather of world music" by George Harrison, Shankar helped millions of classical, jazz and rock lovers discover the centuries-old traditions of Indian music. He also pioneered the concept of the rock benefit with the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh. To later generations, he was known as the estranged father of popular American singer Norah Jones. His last musical performance was with his other daughter, sitarist Anoushka Shankar Wright, on Nov. 4 in Long Beach, Calif; his foundation said it was to celebrate his 10th decade of creating music. The multiple Grammy winner learned that he had again been nominated for the award the night before his surgery. (SOURCE: CBS News)
12.11.12: Lisa della Casa
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Lisa della Casa, a Swiss-born soprano known for her sweet voice and exquisite elegance, has died at 93, the Vienna Opera announced Tuesday. The late English music critic Sir Neville Cardus reportedly once said of Della Casa that one should go to her concerts twice: once to listen, once to look. The soprano "possessed an instrument of crystalline purity," a Times reviewer wrote about her landmark recording of Richard Strauss' "Four Last Songs." Della Casa was born Feb. 2, 1919, in Burgdorf, Switzerland, and trained in Zurich. The young singer's first performance came in 1941 for Puccini's "Madame Butterfly" in the Swiss town of Solothurn-Biel. She remained in neutral Switzerland during World War II. After the war she went on to sing on the world's other great opera stages, including the Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Opera House and La Scala. She was a member of the Vienna State Opera, where she appeared 411 times.(SOURCE: LA TIMES )
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12.10.12: Huw Lloyd-Langton
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Hawkwind guitarist Huw Lloyd-Langton died last Thursday after a two-year battle with cancer, the BBC reports. He was 61. Lloyd-Langton, a London native, appeared on Hawkwind's 1970 debut album but left afterward, playing with Widowmaker in the Seventies. The guitarist rejoined Hawkwind in 1979 and played with the band until 1988, appearing on records from 1980's Levitation through 1988's The Xenon Codex. He continued to make guest appearances with Hawkwind in subsequent years. "Huw had been bravely fighting cancer for a couple of years, but was determined not to let the battle affect his day to day life. He continued to play his guitar, laugh, joke and share the great love he had in his heart, with all who knew him," Hawkwind wrote on their website. "Huw was one of the great guitarists with an individual style and character. He is gone but never forgotten by any of us. He will live on in our music and in our hearts." (SOURCE: Rolling Stone )
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Tim Blake, Harvey Bainbridge, Dave Brock, Simon King and Huw Lloyd-Langton of Hawkwind.
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Passages: Jenni Rivera: Dec 9, 2012
If you set out to design a reality TV star, you couldn’t have created a more perfect specimen than Jenni Rivera, the norteno, banda and Mun2 TV star who died Sunday in the crash of a small plane in the Mexican mountains. She was 43, three times divorced, the mother of five and one of the defining stars of Spanish-language television, where her brassy, no-nonsense style made her such an icon to U.S. Latinas that ABC was developing a sitcom for her, titled just “Jenni." Yet she was also “very down to earth,” her oldest daughter Chiquis said in July. “What you see on television is real, but she’s not one of those stars who forgets her family. She knows what it was like to struggle, so she’s always been there for us.” Rivera developed fragrances, cosmetics and clothing lines, and started the Jenni Rivera Love Foundation, which helps single mothers and victims of domestic abuse. Rivera was both in her earlier life, and that was just the start of a story that made it unnecessary for her reality show to invent any drama. She was born into a musical family, but she took a circuitous route to get into music herself. (SOURCE: New York Daily News )
Passages: Carlo Curley: Aug 11, 2012
Organist Carlo Curley, the “Pavarotti of the Organ,” was a big man with a big following as a concert virtuoso. An artist-in-residence at Fountain Street Church in Grand Rapids during the early 1970s, Curley died Saturday at his home in England. He was 59.
The 6-foot, 4-inch tall artist loomed large as a concert organist, becoming the first to give a solo performance at the White House for President Jimmy Carter and performing frequently for a great many crowned heads of Europe and elsewhere. (SOURCE: MLive: "Carlo Curley, international organ virtuoso who once called Grand Rapids home, has died")
The 6-foot, 4-inch tall artist loomed large as a concert organist, becoming the first to give a solo performance at the White House for President Jimmy Carter and performing frequently for a great many crowned heads of Europe and elsewhere. (SOURCE: MLive: "Carlo Curley, international organ virtuoso who once called Grand Rapids home, has died")
Passages: July 16, 2012: Kitty Wells
Wells was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1976 and received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1991 — the same year it was also presented to Bob Dylan, John Lennon and Marian Anderson. She was only the third country performer — and the first female — to get the recognition, following previous country lifetime achievement award recipients Hank Williams and Roy Acuff.
Wells continued to have an active role at the Grand Ole Opry long after country radio stopped playing her music. She placed 81 records on the Billboard Country Charts from 1952 through 1979 — 35 of those reaching the Top 10. She created the vast majority as a solo artist, but she also scored hit duets with her husband, singer Johnnie Wright; her daughter, Carol Sue, and several with singers Red Foley and Webb Pierce. Wright died last year at 97.
Muriel Ellen Deason was born Aug. 30, 1919, in Nashville, one of the very few major country stars born in the country music capital. Her father, Charles Cary Deason, and uncle were country musicians and her mother, Myrtle Bell Deason, was a gospel singer. (SOURCE: LA Times)
Wells continued to have an active role at the Grand Ole Opry long after country radio stopped playing her music. She placed 81 records on the Billboard Country Charts from 1952 through 1979 — 35 of those reaching the Top 10. She created the vast majority as a solo artist, but she also scored hit duets with her husband, singer Johnnie Wright; her daughter, Carol Sue, and several with singers Red Foley and Webb Pierce. Wright died last year at 97.
Muriel Ellen Deason was born Aug. 30, 1919, in Nashville, one of the very few major country stars born in the country music capital. Her father, Charles Cary Deason, and uncle were country musicians and her mother, Myrtle Bell Deason, was a gospel singer. (SOURCE: LA Times)
Passages: June 6, 2012: Doc Watson
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Watson, a seven-time Grammy Award winner and recipient of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, National Medal of Arts and National Heritage Fellowship, turned the roots music world on its head with his pioneering flat-picking and finger-picking guitar styles; and his soulful baritone renderings of blues, country, gospel and folk tunes have introduced countless people across the world to the music of Appalachia. Watson died Tuesday, May 29, at the age of 89 at Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem following abdominal surgery last week. (SOURCE: Watauga Democrat )
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Passages: May 31, 2012: Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey, a Chicago session guitarist mostly known for his work with the great Miles Davis, has passed away. The axe man was 68 years old. According to The Chicago Reader, Cosey "was a classic musician's musician" who played on many amazing blues and jazz albums. He began his career as a guitarist with Chess Records in the 1960s. There he recorded with Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, the Rotary Connection, Phil Cohran and the late Etta James. Cosey is mostly known for his virtuosic fret work with Miles Davis in the early '70s, playing on the horn blower's more electric albums Agharta, Pangaea, and Get Up With It. After Davis retired, Cosey struggled to latch onto another big project, despite being featured on Herbie Hancock's Future Shock. (SOURCE: Spinner )
05.04.12: Adam Yauch
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Adam Yauch, the gravelly voiced rapper who helped make the Beastie Boys one of the seminal groups in hip-hop, died Friday. He was 47. Yauch, also known as MCA, died in New York after a nearly three-year battle with cancer, his representatives said. He had been diagnosed with a cancerous salivary gland in 2009. At the time, Yauch expressed hope that it was "very treatable," but his illness forced the group to cancel shows and delayed the release of their 2011 album, "Hot Sauce Committee, Pt. 2." He hadn't performed in public since 2009 and was absent when the Beastie Boys were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last month. (SOURCE: Boston.com)
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03.12.12: Michael Hossack
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Longtime Doobie Brothers drummer Michael Hossack has died at age 65.The band's manager, Bruce Cohn, said in a statement that Hossack died of cancer on Monday in his home in Dubois, Wyo., reports AP. "His family was by his side," said a statement on the band's site. "Our thoughts and condolences go out to his family and loved ones. We will miss him greatly." Hossack played with the group from 1971 to 1973 and rejoined in 1987. His drumming can be heard on early Doobies hits including Listen To The Music, China Grove and Blackwater. He stopped. (SOURCE: USA Today)
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03.29.13: Earl Scruggs
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NASHVILLE, Tennessee (Reuters) - Banjo innovator and bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs, a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, died on Wednesday at a Nashville hospital at age 88. He had been in failing health for some time, according to his son, Gary Scruggs, who played bass guitar with his father. Talking about his father's death, he said with a cracking voice: "Heâ??s 88 and it's a slow process." (SOURCE: Chicago Tribune)
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04.14.12: Andrew Love
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Trumpeter Wayne Jackson was the personification of mixed emotions in February when he and his longtime musical partner, saxophonist Andrew Love, were presented with a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award for their work over half a century together as the Memphis Horns. Jackson tearfully acknowledged the music industry accolade for the hundreds of recordings that he and Love made in Memphis and elsewhere. They had backed such R&B and soul music greats as Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, Al Green, Sam & Dave and Wilson Pickett, and rock, pop and country luminaries that included Elvis Presley, U2, Neil Young, Willie Nelson, Robert Cray and James Taylor. Jackson's tears were less about the long-in-coming industry recognition as for the absence that day of Love, who had suffered fromAlzheimer's diseasefor nearly a decade, a fact that his family publicly announced only a few days before the Grammy ceremony. Love died Thursday from complications ofAlzheimer's, said his wife, Willie. He was 70. (SOURCE: LA Times)
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02.20.12: Michael Davis
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Michael Davis, the bassist of legendary rock band the MC5, has died of liver failure, his wife said Saturday. He was 68. Davis died at Enloe Medical Center in Chico, Calif., on Friday afternoon after a month-long hospitalization for liver disease, said Angela Davis. Born on June 5, 1943, the bassist gained attention in the MC5 and later played in a version of the group called DKT-MC5 with former MC5 members Wayne Kramer on guitar and Dennis Thompson on drums. The latter two are now the only surviving members of the classic MC5 lineup: singer Rob Tyner died in 1991 and guitarist Fred "Sonic" Smith, who married singer Patti Smith in 1980, in 1994. Davis is survived by his wife, their three sons, and a daughter from a previous marriage. Memorial plans were pending, said Angela Davis. (SOURCE: Ultimate Guitar)
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01.27.12: Dick Kniss
Dick Kniss, a bassist who performed for five decades with the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary and co-wrote the John Denver hit “Sunshine on My Shoulders,” has died. He was 74. Kniss died Wednesday of pulmonary disease at a hospital near their home in the Hudson Valley town of Saugerties, said his wife, Diane Kniss. Kniss was born in Portland, Ore., and was an original member of Denver’s 1970s band. He also played with jazz greats including Herbie Hancock and Woody Herman. [SOURCE: PB Pulse)
07.24.12: John Levy
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John Levy (pictured), a celebrated bassist who went on to manage the business affairs of a staggering list of prominent jazz musicians, has died at the age of 99. Levy’s wife, Devra Hall Levy, said that her husband died quietly in her arms on Friday in their home in Altadena, Calif., according to the Washington Post.
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Passages: Johnny Otis: Jan 17, 2012
Johnny Otis, the musician, bandleader, songwriter, impresario, disc jockey and talent scout who was often called “the godfather of rhythm and blues,” died on Tuesday at his home in Altadena, Calif. He was 90. His death was confirmed by his manager, Terry Gould.
Leading a band in the late 1940s that combined the high musical standards of big band jazz with the raw urgency of gospel music and the blues, Mr. Otis played an important role in creating a new sound for a new audience of young urban blacks. Within a few years it would form the foundation of rock ’n’ roll. (SOURCE: New York Times: "Johnny Otis, ‘Godfather of Rhythm and Blues,’ Dies at 90")
Leading a band in the late 1940s that combined the high musical standards of big band jazz with the raw urgency of gospel music and the blues, Mr. Otis played an important role in creating a new sound for a new audience of young urban blacks. Within a few years it would form the foundation of rock ’n’ roll. (SOURCE: New York Times: "Johnny Otis, ‘Godfather of Rhythm and Blues,’ Dies at 90")
Passages: Jan 16 2012: Jimmy Castor:
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Jimmy Castor, a singer, saxophonist, percussionist and bandleader whose novelty songs and funk grooves brought him wide popularity in the 1970s and were later sampled for hip-hop records, died of cardiac arrest Jan. 16 in a hospital in Henderson, Nev. He was 71. The death was confirmed by his son, Jimmy Castor Jr.
As leader of the Jimmy Castor Bunch, the elder Castor combined funk and adolescent humor with such novelty songs as “Troglodyte (Cave Man),” a No. 6 Billboard pop hit in 1972, and “The Bertha Butt Boogie” two years later. Mr. Castor’s records featured a recurring cast of characters, including a caveman who chants the mantra “gotta find a woman, gotta find a woman,” and the irrepressible, full-figured dancer Bertha Butt. (SOURCE: Washington Post) |
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Passages: Jan 13, 2012: Charlie Collins
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Charlie Collins, whose stellar and steady rhythm guitar work was an integral element in Roy Acuff's Smoky Mountain Boys, died Thursday, Jan. 12 of complications from his stroke of Jan. 8. He was 78 years old. Also an accomplished mandolinist and fiddle player, Mr. Collins was a Grand Ole Opry regular for 45 years. He played with Acuff's band from 1966 until Acuff's death in 1992, then played the Opry with Brother Oswald, the Opry Square Dance Band and others. "Charlie had such a drive to his playing," said mandolin great Sam Bush, a friend and collaborator of Mr. Collins. "He was such a big part of Mr. Acuff's sound in those later years." (SOURCE: The Tennesseean)
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Passages: Dec 12, 2011: Sam Rivers
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Sam Rivers, a legendary jazz saxophonist who threw raucous jam sessions in his west Village loft, died of pneumonia in Orlando on Monday. He was 88. Rivers was born in El Reno, Oklahoma in 1923. He was heir to a musical legacy that began with his grandfather Marshall W. Taylor, who in 1882 published an early classic of African-American folk music, “A Collection of Revival Hymns & Plantation Melodies.” Rivers’ mother and father played together in a local quartet and encouraged their son to study music from an early age. By age 13, Rivers settled on the tenor saxophone as his instrument of choice. He stuck with the sax for more than 70 years, cutting 35 albums and playing countless gigs with many of the greatest artists in jazz. After a stint in the Navy as a young man, Rivers enrolled in the Boston Conservatory, where he would begin his career as a professional musician. By the mid-1950’s Rivers was backing up Billie Holiday on the sax and acting as musical director for a number of great R&B acts including B.B. King and T-Bone Walker. In 1964 he moved to New York and joined Miles Davis’s quintet, with whom he recorded the seminal live record “Miles in Tokyo.” In that year Rivers also began recording his own groups for Blue Note, eventually releasing four records as a band leader for the famed jazz label. (SOURCE: New York Daily News )
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Passages: Dec 20, 2011: Sean Bonniwell
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They called the Music Machine one-hit wonders, and that was certainly true. The West Coast band had exactly one hit single: their 1966 recording of "Talk Talk," still a prime example of 60's Garage Band rock that didn't even run two minutes. It didn't have to. This was punk before the term existed. The band's personality and visionary of course, was lead singer Sean Bonniwell, who died December 20 of lung cancer in Visalia, California. He was 71. Thomas Harvey Bonniwell, born in San Jose in 1940, played in a folk group called the Wayfarers before gravitating to rock in the 60's. He knew Dylan, Roger McGuinn and David Crosby from his folk days (and found the young Crosby insufferable). But by the mid 60's he, like other folk players, chose to pursue a rock direction. Bonniwell, however, opted for a path other than the folk-rock Dylan and the Byrds were creating. Bonniwell envisioned a tougher sound. The Music Machine, originally known as the Ragamuffins, and "Talk Talk" were the results of that. (SOURCE: Community Voices)
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Passages: Dec 17, 2011: Cesaria Evora
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Cesaria Evora, who started singing as a teenager in the bayside bars of Cape Verde in the 1950s and won a Grammy in 2003 after she took her African islands music to stages across the world, died Saturday. She was 70. Evora, known as the "Barefoot Diva" because she always performed without shoes, died in the Baptista de Sousa Hospital in Mindelo, on her native island of Sao Vicente in Cape Verde, her label Lusafrica said in a statement on its website. It gave no further details. Evora retired in September because of health problems. In recent years she had had several operations, including open-heart surgery last year. She sang the traditional music of the Cape Verde Islands off West Africa, a former Portuguese colony. She mostly sang in the version of Creole spoken there, but even audiences who couldn't understand the lyrics were moved by her stirring renditions, her unpretentious manner and the music's infectious beat. Her singing style brought comparisons to American jazz singer Billie Holiday. "She belongs to the aristocracy of bar singers," French newspaper Le Monde said in 1991, adding that Evora had "a voice to melt the soul." (SOURCE: CBS News )
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Passages: Sept 27, 2011: Johnny Wright
Johnny Wright, 97, the husband of Kitty Wells and one half of the recording duo Johnny & Jack, died today at 97 at his home in Madison, Tenn. Born in Mount Juliet, Tenn., Wright first performed with Jack Anglin in 1936. In 1937, he married Wells, who was 18. The two, along with Wright's sister Louise, performed as Johnnie Wright & the Harmony Girls. In 1939, Wright and Anglin formed Johnnie & Jack. They teamed up full-time in the 1940s and, except for the time Anglin spent overseas during World War II, remained together for more than two decades.
In 1952, Johnnie & Jack's Poison Love led to them being on the Grand Ole Opry, where they and Wells were invited to join and stayed for 15 years. They continued having hits in the 1950s, including Stop the World (And Let Me Off). Following Anglin's death in an car accident in 1963 on his way to the funeral for Patsy Cline, Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas and Randy Hughes. Wright continued performing and releasing records. (SOURCE: Country Standard Time)
In 1952, Johnnie & Jack's Poison Love led to them being on the Grand Ole Opry, where they and Wells were invited to join and stayed for 15 years. They continued having hits in the 1950s, including Stop the World (And Let Me Off). Following Anglin's death in an car accident in 1963 on his way to the funeral for Patsy Cline, Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas and Randy Hughes. Wright continued performing and releasing records. (SOURCE: Country Standard Time)
Passages: Dec 12, 2012: Teena Marie
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R&B singer Teena Marie, best known for her 1980s hits "Lovergirl," "Ooo La La La" and "Lead Me On," died in her sleep last night of unknown causes in her Los Angeles home. She was 54. Marie's debut LP, 1979's Wild and Peaceful, was written with her mentor Rick James, who dueted with Marie on her breakthrough single "I'm A Sucker For Your Love." Motown, who rarely signed white artists, didn't put her photo on the cover — leading to a longstanding belief that Marie was actually black. Teena Marie's most recent release was 2009's Congo Square. She continued to tour until shortly before her sudden death.
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June 14, 2010: New York Times: Jimmy Dean, Folksy Singer, Dies at 81
Jimmy Dean, a country singer and television-show host whose good looks, folksy integrity and aw-shucks Texas charm served him especially well when he went into the sausage business and became his own pitchman, died Sunday at his home in Varina, Va., outside Richmond. He was 81.
Jimmy Dean, a country singer and television-show host whose good looks, folksy integrity and aw-shucks Texas charm served him especially well when he went into the sausage business and became his own pitchman, died Sunday at his home in Varina, Va., outside Richmond. He was 81.
Passages: Jan 9, 2009: Jon Hager
Jon Hager, who performed in the musical comedy duo The Hager Twins on "Hee-Haw," has died. He was 67. Sam Lovullo, who produced "Hee-Haw" and was a friend of Hager's, said Hager was found dead in his apartment Friday morning. He was found in bed and apparently died in his sleep. Lovullo said Hager had been in poor health and was depressed since his identical twin brother, Jim Hager, died in May 2008. The twins were in the original cast of the syndicated TV show, which debuted in 1969 satirizing country life with a mixture of music and comedy. Both were guitarists and drummers.
Passages: Sept 1, 2008: Jerry Reed
Jerry Reed, a popular country singer and movie actor whose larger-than-life storytelling and flashy guitar work vividly evoked Southern life, died early Monday morning at his home here. He was 71.
The cause was emphysema, said Butch Baker, Mr. Reed’s friend and song publisher.
Best known in later years for his role in the movie “The Waterboy” (1998), starring Adam Sandler, and in the three “Smokey and the Bandit” adventures of the late ’70s and early ’80s, in which he played Burt Reynolds’s gear-shifting sidekick the Snowman, Mr. Reed was first and foremost a musician.
Mr. Reed accompanied himself on the three dozen Top 40 country hits he recorded under his own name from 1967 to 1983. Many of the songs also relied on his clowning persona, including his three No. 1 singles, “When You’re Hot, You’re Hot,” “Lord, Mr. Ford” and “She Got the Goldmine (I Got the Shaft).” (SOURCE: New York Times )
The cause was emphysema, said Butch Baker, Mr. Reed’s friend and song publisher.
Best known in later years for his role in the movie “The Waterboy” (1998), starring Adam Sandler, and in the three “Smokey and the Bandit” adventures of the late ’70s and early ’80s, in which he played Burt Reynolds’s gear-shifting sidekick the Snowman, Mr. Reed was first and foremost a musician.
Mr. Reed accompanied himself on the three dozen Top 40 country hits he recorded under his own name from 1967 to 1983. Many of the songs also relied on his clowning persona, including his three No. 1 singles, “When You’re Hot, You’re Hot,” “Lord, Mr. Ford” and “She Got the Goldmine (I Got the Shaft).” (SOURCE: New York Times )
Passages: May 8, 2008: Eddy Arnold
Eddy Arnold, the gentleman crooner who took country music uptown and sold more than 85 million recordings over seven decades, died Thursday. He was 89.
His death, at a care facility near Nashville, was confirmed by the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum.
From his debonair attire to the savvy with which he adapted his sound to popular trends, Mr. Arnold personified the evolution of country music in the years after World War II from a rural vernacular to an idiom with broad mainstream appeal.
“I’ve never thought of myself as a country-and-western singer,” he told a reporter for The Charlotte Observer of North Carolina in 1968. “With the type material I do, I’m really a pop music artist.” He added, “I want my songs to be accepted by everyone.”
Mr. Arnold was a harbinger of the lush, orchestral Nashville Sound, made popular by the likes of Jim Reeves and Patsy Cline in the late 1950s and ’60s. His greatest success was on the country charts, where, taken together, his singles have spent more time — including more time at the top — than those of any other singer in the music’s history. (SOURCE: New York Times)
His death, at a care facility near Nashville, was confirmed by the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum.
From his debonair attire to the savvy with which he adapted his sound to popular trends, Mr. Arnold personified the evolution of country music in the years after World War II from a rural vernacular to an idiom with broad mainstream appeal.
“I’ve never thought of myself as a country-and-western singer,” he told a reporter for The Charlotte Observer of North Carolina in 1968. “With the type material I do, I’m really a pop music artist.” He added, “I want my songs to be accepted by everyone.”
Mr. Arnold was a harbinger of the lush, orchestral Nashville Sound, made popular by the likes of Jim Reeves and Patsy Cline in the late 1950s and ’60s. His greatest success was on the country charts, where, taken together, his singles have spent more time — including more time at the top — than those of any other singer in the music’s history. (SOURCE: New York Times)
Passages: Doyle Holly: Jan 13, 2007
Doyle Holly, the bass guitarist for Buck Owens' band the Buckaroos during its hit-making heyday in the 1960s, has died in Nashville. He was 70. Holly, who died Saturday after a battle with prostate cancer, had been hospitalized Dec. 17.
He took over the bassist's spot in the Buckaroos after Owens had said farewell to another band member who was starting a career of his own: Merle Haggard. Holly spent 1963 to 1971 in one of the anchor positions in the Buckaroos' rhythm section, a period in which Owens recorded most of his biggest hits, including "Act Naturally," "Together Again" and "I've Got a Tiger by the Tail." Another hit, "Love's Gonna Live Here," topped the country singles chart for 16 weeks at the end of 1963. Owens even went to No. 1 with "Buckaroo," a 1965 instrumental that featured the band widely considered one of the best and most influential ensembles in country music history.
"Everybody was in the right place at the right time," Holly said in 2003. "I think what it boils down to was that combination" of Owens, lead guitarist and harmony partner Don Rich, steel guitarist Tom Brumley, Holly and drummer Willie Cantu. Holly and Cantu provided much of the rock-influenced drive that made Owens' records punchier and livelier than their Nashville counterparts. (SOURCE: LA Times )
He took over the bassist's spot in the Buckaroos after Owens had said farewell to another band member who was starting a career of his own: Merle Haggard. Holly spent 1963 to 1971 in one of the anchor positions in the Buckaroos' rhythm section, a period in which Owens recorded most of his biggest hits, including "Act Naturally," "Together Again" and "I've Got a Tiger by the Tail." Another hit, "Love's Gonna Live Here," topped the country singles chart for 16 weeks at the end of 1963. Owens even went to No. 1 with "Buckaroo," a 1965 instrumental that featured the band widely considered one of the best and most influential ensembles in country music history.
"Everybody was in the right place at the right time," Holly said in 2003. "I think what it boils down to was that combination" of Owens, lead guitarist and harmony partner Don Rich, steel guitarist Tom Brumley, Holly and drummer Willie Cantu. Holly and Cantu provided much of the rock-influenced drive that made Owens' records punchier and livelier than their Nashville counterparts. (SOURCE: LA Times )
Passages: Buck Owens: Mar 25, 2006
Buck Owens, the maverick honky-tonk singer who scored a string of country hits that included "Act Naturally" and "Waitin' in Your Welfare Line" before steering country music to television as a co-host of the series "Hee Haw," died on Saturday at his home in Bakersfield, Calif. He was 76.
Mr. Owens died in his sleep, hours after finishing a gig at his concert hall and restaurant, Buck Owens' Crystal Palace, said Jim Shaw, a family spokesman who was the keyboardist in Mr. Owens's band, the Buckaroos. Mr. Shaw noted that Mr. Owens had suffered a stroke some time ago. The singer also suffered from other ailments and underwent surgery for cancer in 1993.
Mr. Owens pioneered a shift in country music toward the "Bakersfield" sound, a raw, electrified take on traditional country that served as an alternative to the lush, string-heavy sound that dominated Nashville in the 1960's. His influence can be heard in the music of artists from Gram Parsons to Brad Paisley. (SOURCE: New York Times)
Mr. Owens died in his sleep, hours after finishing a gig at his concert hall and restaurant, Buck Owens' Crystal Palace, said Jim Shaw, a family spokesman who was the keyboardist in Mr. Owens's band, the Buckaroos. Mr. Shaw noted that Mr. Owens had suffered a stroke some time ago. The singer also suffered from other ailments and underwent surgery for cancer in 1993.
Mr. Owens pioneered a shift in country music toward the "Bakersfield" sound, a raw, electrified take on traditional country that served as an alternative to the lush, string-heavy sound that dominated Nashville in the 1960's. His influence can be heard in the music of artists from Gram Parsons to Brad Paisley. (SOURCE: New York Times)
Passages: Dolly Dawn: December 11, 2002
Dolly Dawn, a big-band vocalist whose honey-sweet voice each noon, six days a week, bounced invitingly across America in the late 1930's and early 40's, died last Wednesday at a nursing home in Englewood, N.J. She was 86.Her death was announced this week by her family.
She was one of the first vocalists to become the sole focus of a band, at a time when bands and musicians were still the main draw. Ella Fitzgerald called Miss Dawn an influence on her own singing. Joe Franklin, the New York radio and television personality, said in an interview that when Walter Winchell coined the term ''canary'' for female singers, he was referring to her.
Miss Dawn dropped out of the limelight and became known mainly to the cult following that saw her in scattered club appearances in the 1970's and 80's, and responded to the release of a two-disk album of her records with George Hall on the RCA Bluebird label in 1976. (SOURCE: New York Times)
She was one of the first vocalists to become the sole focus of a band, at a time when bands and musicians were still the main draw. Ella Fitzgerald called Miss Dawn an influence on her own singing. Joe Franklin, the New York radio and television personality, said in an interview that when Walter Winchell coined the term ''canary'' for female singers, he was referring to her.
Miss Dawn dropped out of the limelight and became known mainly to the cult following that saw her in scattered club appearances in the 1970's and 80's, and responded to the release of a two-disk album of her records with George Hall on the RCA Bluebird label in 1976. (SOURCE: New York Times)
Passages: Aug 25, 2001: Aaliyah
BMI singer/artist Aaliyah died Saturday (8/25) when a chartered Cessna plane carrying her and eight others crashed after take-off from Abaco Island in the Bahamas. The 22-year-old r&b/pop singer and budding actress was on her way to Miami after finishing shooting a new video from her self-titled third album just released in July. The cause of the crash, which killed all nine passengers, was not immediately known. Local police said the plane flew about 200 feet, crashed and caught on fire. Weather was not believed to be a factor. However, CNN reports the pilot had asked the passengers to leave behind some of their luggage because the plane's load was too heavy, but the passengers refused. Bahamian officials have launched an investigation with the help of the NTSB from the U.S. Her debut performance in Romeo Must Die earned her critical acclaim, helping her land roles in other films including the lead in the upcoming Anne Rice film Queen of the Damned, which she had just finished shooting, and two uncompleted Matrix sequels. She is survived by her parents, Diane and Michael Haughton, and a brother, Rashaad. (SOURCE: BMI )
Passages: Mar 7, 2000: Pee Wee King
The passing this week of Pee Wee King has taken from the scene one of Country music's major songwriters and a longtime member of BMI. Of the several hundred songs he wrote, four have received multi-million performances: "Bonaparte's Retreat," "Slow Poke" and "You Belong To Me." And, of course, "Tennessee Waltz," which he co-wrote with his band partner Redd Stewart in 1948. Inspired by Bill Monroe's "Kentucky Waltz," the song was recorded by King and Stewart for RCA, but then took off into a whole other level of success with the release of Patti Page's cover version in 1951. Through the use of multi-tracking, which allowed the vocalist to sing four-part harmony with herself, the record went on to sell 65million copies. The piece has received over 4 million performances and remains one of the most popular songs of all time as well as being named the official state song of Tennessee in 1965. (SOURCE: BMI )
Passages: Oct 2, 1998: Gene Autry
Just two days after his 91st birthday, singer and actor Gene Autry has died. He passed away at his Southern California home, a spokeswoman said. Born September 29, 1907, on a ranch in Tioga, Texas, Autry was working as a railroad telegrapher when Will Rogers heard him sing, and advised him to try show business.
It was good advice. Autry parlayed a $5 mail order guitar into a career as Hollywood's first singing cowboy, appearing on radio, television and the movie screen. And his talent for performing made him his fortune. At his death he had acquired vast real estate holdings, several broadcast stations, and the American League Anaheim Angels baseball team.
Autry released 635 records during his career. He not only co-wrote his trademark tune, "Back in the Saddle Again," but garnered gold records for such non-standard favorites as "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," "Here Comes Santa Claus," "Peter Cottontail" and "You Are My Sunshine." (SOURCE: CNN)
It was good advice. Autry parlayed a $5 mail order guitar into a career as Hollywood's first singing cowboy, appearing on radio, television and the movie screen. And his talent for performing made him his fortune. At his death he had acquired vast real estate holdings, several broadcast stations, and the American League Anaheim Angels baseball team.
Autry released 635 records during his career. He not only co-wrote his trademark tune, "Back in the Saddle Again," but garnered gold records for such non-standard favorites as "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," "Here Comes Santa Claus," "Peter Cottontail" and "You Are My Sunshine." (SOURCE: CNN)
Passages: Nov 23, 1992: Roy Acuff
Roy Acuff, the singer and fiddler who was known to millions of Grand Ole Opry listeners as the King of Country Music, died yesterday at Baptist Hospital in Nashville. He was 89 years old. He died of congestive heart failure, a hospital statement said.
Mr. Acuff, in his six decades as an entertainer, became known for his virtuosity on the yo-yo, his collection of handpainted ties and his ability to balance a fiddle bow on his nose. But he was first and last a "hillbilly music" traditionalist. He performed his best-known songs, "Wabash Cannonball," "The Great Speckled Bird" and "The Precious Jewel," with an acoustic string band and sang in the white-gospel tenor style he had learned while listening to Baptist services performed by his father in the mountains of Tennessee. Co-Founder of a Company
The climb of Mr. Acuff, particularly after he joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1938, also coincided with country's shift from string-band and vocal-harmony music to a style dominated by solo singers with bands. (SOURCE: New York Times )
Mr. Acuff, in his six decades as an entertainer, became known for his virtuosity on the yo-yo, his collection of handpainted ties and his ability to balance a fiddle bow on his nose. But he was first and last a "hillbilly music" traditionalist. He performed his best-known songs, "Wabash Cannonball," "The Great Speckled Bird" and "The Precious Jewel," with an acoustic string band and sang in the white-gospel tenor style he had learned while listening to Baptist services performed by his father in the mountains of Tennessee. Co-Founder of a Company
The climb of Mr. Acuff, particularly after he joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1938, also coincided with country's shift from string-band and vocal-harmony music to a style dominated by solo singers with bands. (SOURCE: New York Times )